‘Downton Abbey': Mary Should Pick Lord Gillingham Over Charles Blake

During the Feb. 23 finale of ‘Downton Abbey,’ Lady Mary (Michelle Dockery) left us with a major cliffhanger when she decided to ‘choose to live’ rather than choose between Lord Gillingham and Charles Blake. Here’s why Lord Gillingham is the obvious choice.

Lady Mary (Michelle Dockery) has never been particularly great in the timely decision-making department, and she continued that streak during Downton Abbey‘s Feb. 23 Season 4 finale by refusing to choose between Lord Anthony Gillingham (Tom Cullen) and Charles Blake (Julian Ovenden).

‘Downton Abbey’ — Why Lord Gillingham Is Better Than Charles Blake

I’m not even going to get into the fact that Charles Blake likes to roll around in the mud with pigs for no reason, so he’s basically one Go Go Juice away from becoming Honey Boo Boo.

Downton Abbey With Cats

And I also realize that I’ll field some criticism for the fact that Tony Gillingham follows Mary around like a puppy dog, and that he had a fiancee at the beginning of the season. But still. Unlike Charles “Wild Card” Blake, Tony has been honest about who he is and what he wants from the get-go — something pretty refreshing for someone who has dealt with as much treachery as Lady Mary. Also, he’s known her since they were in diapers — or whatever people wore back then instead of diapers (don’t want to know) — so he’s had plenty of time to figure out what he wants. And what he wants, with every fiber of his being, is Lady Mary.

Yes, yes, I know — being fake-poor is SO ROMANTIC. Who wouldn’t love to fall in love, only to find out that that person is a millionaire? But do you recall, fellow fans, that it was Lord Gillingham who revealed Charles’ truth to Lady Mary and not the man himself? So basically, Charles was down with more lying, while Gillingham told the truth because he wanted a “fair fight” for Lady Mary’s hand.

Sounds like quite a guy to me.

‘Downton Abbey’ — We’ve Done This All Before, No?

Then there’s the She’s All That rom-com angle when it comes to Blake; the same sort of chemistry that initially kept us intrigued about the Mary-Matthew romance.

Matthew was from a “meh” family, she was not. He was totally interested, she was not. Basically, we’ve done the “impossible couple with undeniable chemistry that only they can see that will totally eventually get together because this is television” couple before, and look how that turned out. Wouldn’t it be interesting to see how Mary might react to marrying the lovestruck, “boring” guy she’s supposed to marry? Would she get bored by the responsibility of having to do what she’s supposed to do? Would she stray with the tempting Mr. Blake? I don’t know, but I’d be pretty damn excited to find out.

What do you think, HollywoodLifers? Should Mary choose Gillingham, or Blake?